Have you found the ideal social media dashboard? API's now allow for integrating multiple networks and functions so that you can streamline your activities. The challenge is finding the right tools for you – those that allow you to more effectively engage with your social network communities.
This involves more than bringing multiple technologies together into one place. In fact, putting too much stuff in one place can result in a non-functional mess. At least that has been my experience with some social media tools.
Just as there are many modes of transportation to you from point A to B, so it is with the social media tools. In order to find what's best for you, you have to first establish your priorities, test-drive several applications, and find the best mix for accomplishing your small business objectives.
Engagement vs Posting
My top priority with social networking is engagement. I've found many tools that that help streamline the posting process, but they tend to fall short when it comes to engagement. There is a big difference between posting and engagement. Posting delivers content, but it's engagement that produces results.
Recently, I have been testing a number of tools, both free and subscription, with Postling being my current favorite for facilitating engagement across multiple networks. For one thing, its dashboard feels right to me – it fits my eye.
You know how an automobile can have every feature you want, but almost instantly you know it's not right for you? This is something you should consider for your social media dashboard if you expect to be comfortable spending time there.
The tipping point for me with Postling was discovering that it is the only tool that allows me to monitor comments on my professional Facebook page.
There are a number of tools that will do this with personal profiles, but for me, when I'm interacting on Facebook I want to bring it all together in one place to better manage my business.
Posting Tools That Fit My Style
When you are evaluating social media tools, be clear about your goals. Avoid duplicated efforts, and by all means, remember that you will only monetize your social media efforts when you maximize your engagement.
That said, here are some of my favorites.
Ping.fm is an old standby for many of us, and it works even better since it was acquired by Seesmic. Ping.fm is easy to use, fast, and reliable. I especially appreciate the message that confirms my post has been successfully processed.
Even though I could use Ping to post to my Facebook page, I prefer to do so manually. Why? Because I sometimes use different language with that community to encourage a different type of engagement. This personal preference is a matter of style. I encourage you to find yours.
Hootsuite is a popular dashboard, but I use it only to schedule future tweets – while also sometimes simultaneously posting to my Facebook profile. I'll typically do this when I'm seeking deeper engagement with content that I have previously posted via Ping.
Google Reader is my favorite monitoring tool. I use it within the iGoogle platform, which is my home page. I use Google Reader not only for subscribing to blog feeds, but also for subscribing to Google Alerts. My objective is to keep my inbox as clean as possible.
I can consume an enormous amount of content with Google Reader. Even when I'm on the run, I can favorite specific posts or alerts that I will return to later. This is a great strategy for monitoring commentary among different blogs, while later sharing only what is most relevant to your community.
Picplz is a new tool that that allows you to use your Android or iPhone to post photos to Twitter and Facebook with one click. You can also engage with others on these networks to follow their photo postings, and they yours. I have a hunch that Picplz may be able to do what Flickr has attempted, but not successfully pulled off – build a social network through the sharing of images.
Echofon is my favorite iPhone Twitter application for one simple reason – it's loads quickly. This is one of the primary benefits of apps, yet many fall short in this area. Another cool feature of Echofon is it auto-completes the Twitter addresses of your friends to further simplify tweeting on the fly.
Make Your Own Decisions
When it comes to using social media, we both know that the list of tools is endless. It's up to you to decide what is best for you and your small business. That's what makes any tool useful – its ability to accomplish specific objectives that enhance your productivity.
The only way to figure all of this out is to be clear about your social networking objectives, take the time to experiment, and above all – trust your gut.
That's all for this week. If this has been useful – leave a comment below or share it with YOUR friends by clicking the Facebook Like button. And please consider subscribing to the feed.
Have a Great Weekend, Jeff
